How did they know?
When I venture back out, the kid’s already back and a silvery blue Pontiac has stopped in front of him. The driver leans over to talk. The hand he puts on the passenger door is fat and fleshy and pale; I can see his face only in silhouette. The boy climbs in the car. I follow them around the corner. The car parks and the boy’s head disappears. I’m not stupid; I know what he’s doing. That’s his business; I don’t really care. I wait anyway. I’m not sure why, maybe to see how he looks when he comes out.
* * *
I can’t get the nerve to tell my bus money story again. I doubt if it would work now, anyway. I look different—not fresh like when I got here three weeks ago. But I’ve learned a few things—like, you can’t keep underwear clean so it’s best not to wear any. Like, people drop change everywhere and you can find a least a couple dollars a day, if you really look. Like, there’s a sixth sense you get about how to take care of yourself. That laundry is cheapest down at Angel’s on Mission. Easy too, you put in everything but your pants, and pay attention. People mostly don’t use all their dry time—you can usually get minutes for free, if you’re quick.
I know it’s best to not to go the same gas station all the time to wash up; attendants get nosy. Going to the same Dumpster is good—you can keep track of what’s fresh. Oh, and the 24-hour donut shop gives out freebies to street kids if you come in after eleven o’clock. The guy who runs it is named Tony and he never calls the cops. Lots of kids hang out there. Mostly, they’re friendly.
My nook’s still good. I find a green striped blanket somebody tossed out and an old blue and white comforter that I sleep on. I stay way to the back and sometimes tuck my backpack into the very farthest corner, so I won’t have to carry it all day. I make sure not to let anyone see me slip in. Castro isn’t quite as grand as I once thought, but it’s okay. I’m not sorry I’m here. I love the city, especially Union Square. I sit there for hours and watch people.
I miss my dad, and Marianne. Sometimes Davy too. I know he thinks of me, misses me, wonders what I’m doing.
I see the kid from Polk Street a lot now. He’s got a buddy who’s older, like maybe seventeen, and another one around our age. I don’t think they sleep here. The older guy kind of reminds me of Paul. I like his face; it’s wise, like he knows a lot of stuff. Tonight he’s strolling by himself. It’s around two in the morning. I’m usually not out, but I couldn’t sleep. I expect he’ll walk on past, like usual, but he stops.
“Why you always watching me?” he asks.
“I’m not.”
“Yeah, you are. What’s your name?”
I almost lie. “Jason.”
“Just got here?”
“No.”
“Yeah you did.”
I start inching back.
“Don’t freak, Jason, I won’t hurt you. I’m Tommy.” He holds out his hand. “Pleased to meetcha.”
I take the hand he holds out to me, but don’t know what to say.
“Want some coffee?” he asks. I follow him to the donut shop. We slide in a booth with two other boys.
“Nick. Adam. Jason,” Tommy says, pointing at each of us. “Two coffees, Tony? And a jelly roll if you have it.”
Nick’s telling Adam about a date he had with a fat guy. They don’t pay much attention to me, but I sure do like the company, and the stories of what they do on the street.
“You work?” Adam asks, out of the blue. I blush, everybody’s staring at me.
“No.”
“Why not?” Adam wants to know. “You think you’re too good? You think you’re better than us?”
I shrug and mumble “no.”
“Leave him alone, Adam,” Tommy says.
“He’s staring,” Adam says. He reminds me of Davy.
Nick laughs. “You’re so paranoid.”
“Stop staring,” Adam says, pouting.
Knowing people helps. I start hanging out at the donut shop every once in awhile. I hear how Tommy’s from L.A. and got here three years ago. I learn stuff about surviving—about how you can stay under benches in Golden Gate Park when it rains. The avenue side. Or if you have change, you get on the green bus. You mind your business and curl up in the corner in the very back. If nobody complains, they usually let you ride all night. Sometimes I go for days without thinking about my family.
{4}
“Waiting for someone?”
I’m startled. I’ve just snatched a piece of pizza left on a plate in front of the café. I stop, mid-bite. I didn’t see the guy coming. “Excuse me?”
“I wonder if I might treat you to dinner? If you’re not otherwise occupied.”
“Sorry. I’m not a working boy.”
He smiles, glances at the pizza in my hand. “I thought perhaps you were hungry.”
His name is Nigel. We walk to a Chinese restaurant down the street. Inside is painted red and gold, with a huge dragon that takes up one whole wall. Its eyes follow me. I think of Jesus. Nigel gets a booth at the back. He orders tons of stuff I don’t recognize and then tries to show me how to do chopsticks. I almost get it, but then drop my moo goo whatever on the tablecloth. He laughs and gets me a fork. I try everything he orders.
“Dessert at my place?” Nigel says just after the waiter sets down the fortune cookies. “I’m just around the corner.”
I’ve heard all about sugar daddies from Nick and Adam. How they’re usually older. How they give you a place to sleep and take good care of you, and all you have to do is be nice. Is this it? Have I met mine?
Nigel lives in a light blue apartment building just off Castro, a converted Victorian I’ve walked past a billion times. He unlocks the iron gate and we go through a tiny garden of miniature trees, with a small statue of a boy peeing into a pond. I giggle and Nigel smiles. He leads me up a spiral staircase and into his apartment. It’s like nothing I’ve seen before. It’s perfect. The colors, the shape of the furniture, the stuff hanging on the walls—all of it fits.
“Do make yourself at home,” Nigel says. “I’ll be out in a jiffy.” I hear him turn on the shower.
I sit on the sofa, bounce on the cushy loveseat. Two tall bar stools whirl all the way around, I spin a couple of times on each of them. I can’t stop smiling. I wander into the kitchen, which is arranged exactly how I would want mine, if I had one. I peek into the bedroom—the bed looks fluffy and has tons of pillows.
Nigel comes out in a pair of lounge pants and a dressing jacket. His hair’s wet, combed back, and he smells delicious. He looks younger. He asks if I’d like to smoke some weed, which seems so weird I start to giggle again. He smiles.
“Haven’t you ever been high?”
“Yeah, sure, lots of times, with my brother,” I say, thinking of Paul, and how Davy and I sneaked it with him sometimes at the old house. “It just seems strange that you do it.”
“How old are you, Jason?” he asks, as he brings out a water pipe that looks like it came from Ali Baba and his forty thieves.
“Almost seventeen,” I lie, and shrug. “Just small.”
After we smoke and nibble some amazing chocolate truffle cookies, Nigel runs me a bath with bubbles. The bathroom’s all silver and white. He sits on a stool beside me and we talk as I wash up. Or he talks, mostly about his friend Jean Louis who’s gone back to France to visit his mother. How much he misses him. How lonely he gets when he’s gone. He washes my back. We have another dessert—green tea ice cream and some dark chocolate thing that melts in my mouth. Then we crawl in his supersoft king-size bed.
I wake before he does and wonder exactly how he’ll ask me. “Jason, I simply must have you stay!” or “Dear boy, would you consider living here?” I run through the choices, smiling the whole time. I’ll do it. I will. I like him. I like the apartment, it feels safe. When he goes to work, I’ll stay in and tidy up, maybe learn how to cook. He won’t miss Jean Louis so much. Maybe he won’t miss him at all. Maybe Jean Louis will have to find another place to live.
Th
e alarm goes off. He opens his eyes.
“Hello,” I say, smiling. I’m sitting cross-legged down at the end of the bed. It takes him a minute to speak.
“Jason,” he says, obviously surprised that I’m here. “Good morning.” He sits up and sighs, pats my arm. “I’m sorry, sweetie, I’m afraid I have to go to work.”
“That’s okay. I don’t mind.” I can feel how my face sparkles. He seems not to know what to say. He slides out of bed and puts on his robe. He leans to give me a kiss on the cheek.
“Darling boy, that means you have to go.”
“Oh. Right. Sure. Okay.” I slide off the bed, look around for my clothes. “Of course. Well, thanks for dinner, and everything.”
“You’re very welcome.”
Out in the living room, I hear him turn on the shower running in the bathroom. I stop by the closed door.
“Nigel?” I call. “Do you think maybe I could borrow five dollars?” Where am I getting the guts to do this? “For the train home?”
“Of course, sweetie,” he calls back. “My wallet’s on the table, take the ten.”
I take the twenty and slip out the door.
{5}
All I notice this morning are people together: brothers and sisters, friends, moms and kids, lovers, husbands and wives.
And me. Alone.
My nook’s not cozy now, it’s grungy and cold. Kids in the park look sad and tired. Polk Street’s filthy, with awful men, cheap bars. I don’t know what to do with myself. I can’t stay in The Castro today. I get coffee from Tony, then see Tommy and Nick coming. I head the other way. I end up where I always do when I’m feeling bad—down at Union Square. I climb up on a planter to watch the people.
I wonder what Davy’s doing, if Dad’s working on a new painting, what Marianne’s having for lunch. An ache as big as the city wraps itself around my heart. This is no big adventure, I’m not a brave boy, I have no quest. I’m just another lonely street kid. Nothing special.
A woman with a little girl stares from the other side of the square. She’s wearing yellow, my mom’s color, except she’s blond, like her daughter. Like me. She smiles as she sweeps a strand of her daughter’s hair back from her face, then crosses toward me.
“Sweetheart, are you all right?” she asks. The little girl peers up, her head tipping back. Her hair shines in the sun, like a halo.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“What’s your name?”
“Tommy.”
“When did you run away, Tommy?”
Is she a cop? A social worker? I should jump down now and run, but I don’t.
“Is your family in the city?”
I shake my head no.
“East Bay?”
No again.
“Marin?”
I nod yes. I’ve never been there, but it sounds good.
“You have a mom?”
I nod. “She’s at home.”
“Okay. Tommy, you seem like a good boy and I want to tell you something really important. Mothers love their children more than life. Whatever happened, your mom will forgive you. I promise. She’s probably worried sick.”
She pushes a strand of hair out of my face. Her skin is smooth and cool. I think she’s beautiful.
“Here’s five dollars. Catch the Muni to Lombard then Golden Gate Transit across the bridge, all right? Check on the bus stop to see which number. Okay? Promise?”
“Yes, ma’am. Thank you.”
“Who shall I say is calling?” the operator asks when I tell her I’d like to make this collect. I close the door to the phone booth to hear better. It took me a whole hour of thinking to decide that woman was right. How could my mom come find me? Or my dad? They don’t know where I am. They’ve got to be worried sick.
“Her son.”
“Which one?” Mom asks. Of course—Paul doesn’t live there, either.
“Jason.” I hold my breath, all of a sudden panicked, anticipating a click. Instead, she accepts the charges.
“Are you okay?” she asks, not sounding mad at all.
“I’m fine.” My stomach relaxes. I smile. I’ll be going home soon.
“Where are you calling from?”
“A friend’s house.”
The operator’s stayed on the line.
“You are not, young man. You’re at a pay phone in downtown San Francisco.”
This silence is heavy. My stomach twists again. I hear Mom light a cigarette.
“Don’t call me up just to lie to me, Jason.” Her voice is flat now, like that night.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”
“What do you want?”
“Can I come home now?” I blurt it out. I didn’t know I was thinking it.
“Are you done being gay?”
I sigh. “No.”
She takes a drag of her cigarette and I hear the smoke whoosh out. I imagine her wearing her yellow dress, her hair up; I picture the smoke curling around the sides of her face.
“Look, Jason. You’re my son and I love you. When you’re done doing—whatever you’re doing there—call me and you can come home.”
“I can never be ‘done,’ Mom.”
“Then you’ll never come home, will you?”
Click.
* * *
Saturday, as I wash up and shampoo my hair in the Shell station sink, I feel a pang. If I were home, I’d have hot water and a shower and real shampoo. I’d be fooling around with Davy or getting ready for dinner or talking to Marianne. Mom would be finishing up setting the table and—I stop myself. I’m not home. I’m here and need to move forward. I finish up, duck out the door, and realize—so is Davy. Here. In the city. Right now. Not that far away.
I get to the Conservatory right when morning classes are ending. A woman I don’t recognize stops me at the entrance gate.
“Yes?” she says, with a pleasant smile.
“Hi. I’m looking for my brother. Davy Commagere?”
“Oh.” Her face darkens. “You’re Jason, aren’t you?” She checks the lock. “I’m sorry, dear, you can’t come in.”
“But…”
“Please go, or I’ll have to call the police.”
I back away. What did my mother tell them? The woman goes in and I sneak around the side and go in the main hall door. I see Isabelle. Her eyes widen; she pulls me around the pillar in the back corner.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” she whispers.
“I need to see Davy,” I whisper back.
“I don’t know, Jason.”
“Please?”
“All right, okay. Stay here. I’ll get him.”
I squish as far into the corner as I can, wait until he rounds the corner with his sassy dancer’s walk, towel draped over his shoulder, looking like always, except older.
“Hi,” I say, stepping out, a big smile on my face. “You got taller.”
He doesn’t smile back. “You’re not supposed to be here, Jason.”
“That’s what everybody keeps saying.”
“You need to go.” His voice sounds distant, cold.
“What?”
“Just go.”
“But I want to talk to you.”
“I can’t be around you, okay?”
“Davy, I—”
“Go. Now. I mean it. Don’t come back here.”
“Look, whatever Mom said—”
“It’s not Mom, Jason.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I don’t want to see you, okay?” He grabs Isabelle’s hand and starts off.
“Davy!”
He whirls. “You’re not my brother anymore. You got that? You’re not my brother.”
Neither one of them looks back. I should move, but I seem to have forgotten how. People slow down and stare, whisper. I hear my name. I think I see Michael. Down at the end of the hall, the woman from the gate starts walking toward me. A security guy is with her.
“He didn’t mean that.” I’m talking to myself, but I spe
ak out loud. Somebody laughs.
“You! Jason!” the woman calls. I move then, out the hall door, around to the street.
“He didn’t mean it.” I say out loud, again. I hear the gate shut behind me. Boys and girls chattering. I keep walking. Davy’s not used to me like this, he needs some time. It always takes him time. A few days, a week, a month, maybe, we’ll be fine. I’ll give him some time. He’ll think about it, we’ll get together and talk. This day will seem funny then. I look at my fingernails, oh boy, do they need cutting. I wonder if Nick still has that manicure set. Maybe we could also do a little trim on my hair.
This will all work out fine. Davy’s my family. Families don’t just stop.
Late 1978
A YEAR AND A HALF BEFORE
LOS ANGELES COUNTY
{1}
“Fix me, fix my head! Fix me please, I don’t wanna be dead!”
Black Flag wails from the cassette deck and we all sing along. I could fly right now. Mark weaves between cars on the freeway and an asshole in a black pickup lays on his horn. Aw, rough life, poor baby had to brake. Four hands shoot out four windows, middle fingers pointing up.
“Fuuuuuck yoooooou!”
We chant it like a chorus, then laugh. I laugh loudest of all. I open my second beer and my brain spits out possibilities too vast to consider in one moment. This is what it’s all about. Life. Life is good. The speed of this car. The music blasting. Rosie bouncing and singing next to me. Mark’s brand-new scorpion tattoo curving around his neck.
In the backseat, Jack lights a joint. Jack’s my age, my new hero; he dropped out of school. He stays with Mark sometimes. Mark’s like my big brother now. He’s twenty-five. I twist to get the joint and that shit-ass ice-pick pain shoots down from my bad hip all the way to my heel. It takes my breath. I hold the joint to my lips but can’t inhale, not right away. I shift my weight; it doesn’t help. How long is a metal pin supposed to hurt? Forever? Is that the price? Even now?
Freaks and Revelations Page 9
